Stephanie Woods

Stephanie is part of our national Dispute Resolution Team. Her recent experience has been primarily in acting for parties in a range of trust related disputes, acting for plaintiffs in earthquake insurance disputes, and acting for a range of insurers and insureds in professional indemnity matters. She also has a strong interest in professional ethics and in public law related disputes, both at a local and central government level.

Stephanie was a Clerk to the Chief Justice, Dame Sian Elias, during 2008-2009 and completed a LLM at Harvard University during 2010-2011 specialising in public law, professional ethics and tort law.

Recent Articles

A recent High Court case: McCullagh v Robt Jones Holdings Limited [2017] NZHC 2182, provides an interesting illustration of the application of the voidable transaction regime to payments made by third parties on behalf of a debtor company.

The Arbitration Act 1996 (Act) was enacted to facilitate the arbitration of commercial disputes and to enable international arbitration so that disputes decided here can be easily enforced in other jurisdictions. In principle, the incorporation of an arbitration clause should lead to the successful resolution of such disputes in a private, expeditious, and cost-effective way.

You have obtained judgment against your debtor in the District Court or the High Court and are looking towards your enforcement options, such as bankruptcy or liquidation proceedings. But what if the debtor decides to appeal the decision – can you still enforce the judgment?

An important principle in the law of trusts is that a trustee must not, with some very limited exceptions, place themselves in a position in which duty and interest conflict. This is known as the rule against self-dealing.
The Supreme Court has recently considered this rule in a decision in the context of ahu whenua trusts established under the Te Ture Whenua Maori Act 1993 (Act).

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